The present invention relates generally to railroad hump yards and, more specifically, to a method of marshalling cars into a train.
Railroads use hump yards to marshal trains. The hump yard basically provides a switch point where a car can be attached to one of many trains. A string of cars is pushed up an incline by a switcher locomotive. When the car reaches the crest of the incline or hump, the car is released from the string and rolls down the hump to pick up speed. Part way down the hill or hump, the car will encounter a retarding device that will slow the car to the proper speed. The ideal speed represents just enough energy to cause the couplers of the mating cars to engage, but no more. The car will also encounter a series of switches to direct the car to the appropriate train. Any excess speed or energy as the car couples to the train will be transferred to the car and lading. The retarding devices and the switches are generally controlled remotely from a hump yard tower.
Typical examples of hump or classification yards are shown in U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,610,206 and 5,758,848. A review of methods for sorting the cars for marshalling in the switch yards or other locations is described in U.S. Pat. No. 6,418,854. Outbound trains are built using proper standing order for departure directly on classification tracks using a continuously sustainable multi-stage sorting process. The use of a multi-stage switching yard with two or more subyards is described in U.S. Pat. No. 6,516,727.
Also, in the hump or other yards, the locomotive may be controlled from a remote location by an operator on the ground. The remote control locomotive (RCL) systems usually include an RCL device carried by the operator. In the industry, these are known as “belt packs.” The location of the RCL operator is important to the management of the yard, as well as the control signals that are sent to the locomotive. From the ground perspective, the RCL operator does not always have an appropriate perspective of the total layout of the yard, much less the total train. Also, since he is not on the train, he cannot sense the forces in the train by the seat of his pants, as most well-trained over the road operators can. An advanced RCL system and method are shown in U.S. Pat. No. 6,789,005, which is incorporated herein by reference.
The present invention is a method of optimizing marshalling rail cars into a train at a site and includes determining the track configuration at the site; determining location on the tracks of cars to be marshaled; determining characteristics of the cars to be marshaled; and determining marshalling rules. A calculation is performed to determine an optimum sequence of moves to marshal the cars into a train from the determined track configuration, location on the tracks of cars, characteristics of the cars and the marshalling rules. The resulting sequence is outputted. The moves of the optimum sequence to marshal the cars into a train are performed. Recalculation of the optimum sequence while the moves may be performed.
The output may be one or more of a printout, a screen and oral. The sequence may be outputted to a screen with a checklist and including updating the checklist in response to entries from an operator.
The calculating may be performed on a processor and the results of the determining steps may be inputted in and/or stored on the processor. The site location and car locations may be determined by a global position type system and inputted into the processor; and the track configuration at the site may be determined by the processor from stored track configurations corresponding to the site location. At least two of the location of the cars, characteristics of the cars and marshalling rules may be determined and transmitted to the processor. The processor may be one of a handheld device, a remote control locomotive device, a locomotive processor and a tower/remote processor.
The actual moves performed for the marshalling of the cars into the train may be determined and stored. The actual moves may be compared with the optimum sequence and a report prepared.
The marshalling rules include car destination and route to be taken to its destination. One or more of fuel economy, time to destination and in-train force of the marshaled train over the route may be determined and a report be prepared of the determination. The location of the cars in the marshaled train may be changed based on the report and, recalculation of one or more of fuel economy, time to destination and in-train force of the new marshaled train over the route and outputting a report of the determination may be performed. The recalculation is performed one of automatically and in response to operator input.
These and other aspects of the present invention will become apparent from the following detailed description of the invention, when considered in conjunction with accompanying drawings.